grace zhang

design eng

2023 - Now

Partiful

party is work, party is life

Partiful's most active hosts were using the app to throw the event, then immediately spinning up a separate groupchat to keep their community alive. The product had no answer for what happens after the party.The product had no answer for what happens after the party.

So we built a dedicated home base for groups on Partiful.

Communities app preview in an iPhone frame

My roleProduct lead Product designer Frontend engineerApp + Web

Community org hosts with recurring events ON Partiful

Event series orgs with recurring events ON Partiful

Community org hosts off Partiful

People looking for new communities

Grassroots communities with no clear leader

often same repeat attendees

more similar to groupchats

The hard early callsNo discovery, no interest-based forums, no trying to poach Whatsapp users.We focused on hosts who already run recurring events on Partiful — the book club organizers, dinner club hosts, and pickup basketball groups.

What we builtExtremely simple, we wanted to be resourceful and reuse as many existing components as possible.Bare minimum to test our hypothesis while making our experience still feel premium.

Community page1 entry pointBeta launch to power usersCreate FlowComplete entry points

we learn and decide

up in the air

The strict prioritizationJust the community page first - a canvas. Then, watch what people do with it. We traded off feature completion for speed.

If you didn't get an invite, you didn't know it existed. Discover was the solution: a place to find what's happening. People should come to Partiful not because they had an event to go to, but to discover one instead. We needed to rewire how users interact with Partiful.We needed to rewire how users interact with Partiful.

My roleProduct designer Frontend engineerApp + Web

Explore mobile app flow exploration in an iPhone frame

The trapThe brief was completely open-ended, which in hindsight was the hardest kind. I went deep on shiny new ideas and lost sight of the basics.

photos make anything look good

the reality with posters - my eyesss

Photos vs postersCards looked polished with beautiful photos, but most real events used text-heavy flyers and posters.

still love this

Fun ideasOne direction tried to make Explore feel tactile and playful, more like finding something pinned up in the real world than scrolling another feed.

The brandingI wanted to create a distinct identity for the surface while keeping it grounded in Partiful. Expressive, dense, and a little chaotic in a way that felt true to browsing events.

This feature lets you RSVP and tie your guest directly to your spot. Simple concept, extremely hard to get right.Simple concept, extremely hard to get right.

Linked +1s multiple guests screen in an iPhone frame

My roleProduct designerApp + Web

Linked +1s product flow map across app, mobile web, desktop, and app clip

The depthAn exercise in information heirarchy and architecture. 4 ways to add a plus one and the user must be able to find exactly what they are looking for intuitively

The breadthThe flow had to be translated across 4 platforms and stay cohesive, consolidating different component bases as well.

Fun little side project, bring back the early internet!

My roleProduct designer Frontend engineer

We iterated and prototyped like crazy on ideas to prompt users to upload photos to Partiful.

Enjoy all these fun ideas and mocks <3Enjoy all these fun ideas and mocks <3

My roleProduct designerStory format with prompts at the top and replies as 弹幕. Literally think about this idea all the time.

Photos story upsell concept with an event photo prompt

Photos story upsell concept showing story progress

Photos story upsell concept with saved event photos

User education before starting a shared storyEveryone adds to the same shared story for an event. It's a shared experience after all so why not reflect that in the photos feature too.

how cute

Pixelate, not blurFun little way to represent “locked” content without the classic blur + lock icon combo.

Locked event photos prompt before adding a photo

Unlocked event photos prompt after adding a photo

Snap to unlockA playful paywall for the shared story: add yours first, then see what everyone else posted. Also I just wanted to try a HUGEEE button.

Send a photo blastLike BeReal but you get to send the notification (and with a prompt).

In three years at Partiful I've touched so many surface areas and done a huge variety of design. This is a mix of both large projects and small fun side graphics.

App of the Year

2024 Winner

Partigenie party idea generator in an iPhone frame

Onboarding - Party GenieFun twist to get users to create events. The editors loved this feature so much that it kinda won us Play Store's App of the Year in 2024 :D

Green Partiful slime graphic on a black rounded square

Slime PA good idea + fucking around with blend modes and 10 minutes in photoshop.

New!

Welcome to Cards

For birthday wishes, announcements, and more! Send digital cards to friends, lovers, and enemies.

Try it out

Cardiful creation flow in an iPhone frame with a welcome bottom sheet

CardsWorked on a greeting cards feature for Partiful. Animation by @Dim.

Partiful live activity lock screen preview in an iPhone frame

nyc martini crawl #3

Thank you for partying!

click mee

Live ActivitiesiOS live activities for events. Mostly a UI iteration playground. Also explored a really cute post-event fortune cookie idea.

RSVP confirmation screen recording in an iPhone frame

RSVP Confirmation VideoThis was so annoying to implement and as my first eng task too (pre AI). You can see how old the app looks in this screen recording from my PR.